KARACHI: Muhammad Anwar Alvi was beside himself with joy when he was reunited with his sister, Shumaila, after 15 long years. Shumaila had ventured out of her home in the eastern city of Attock in 2010 to buy a snack from a nearby shop. She was found by her family in the southern port city of Karachi this week, hundreds of miles away, now aged 40.
Shumaila, suffering from mental health challenges, was found by her family last week after relatives in Attock spotted a video posted online by the Punjab Safe City project on Facebook. The project is a government initiative featuring a city-wide digital security and surveillance system. It aims to strengthen law enforcement via artificial intelligence-driven facial and vehicle number plate recognition.
The video featured an interview of Shumaila, who had been found by railway police in Karachi 15 years earlier and handed over to the care of the Edhi Foundation, Pakistan’s largest charity organization, in the city.
“Today our sister has been born again,” Alvi said. “I don’t have words for the Edhi Center to express my gratitude.”
The foundation operates “panahgahs” or shelter homes that provide food, accommodation, medical care and protection to thousands of abandoned children, orphans, homeless people, women and victims of domestic abuse.
Anwar’s case isn’t the only one. Four young women, who went missing years ago, were recently reunited with their overjoyed families in various parts of Punjab and northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) provinces through the same initiative.
Shabana Faisal Edhi, who oversees the shelter homes, told Arab News that while the foundation tries its best to reunite missing persons with their families, some stay for long periods spanning 15-17 years.
Kiran Abdul Majeed arrived at the Edhi Foundation’s Islamabad center in 2008 when she was only 10. Bilquis Edhi, the late wife of Edhi Foundation’s founder, was the driving force behind the shelter homes.
She found Majeed at the Islamabad center suffering from a high fever and immediately arranged for her to be transferred to Karachi. Majeed remained under the foundation’s care for 17 years as repeated attempts to locate her family failed.
The breakthrough for Majeed, like many others, came via the Punjab Safe City initiative. After nearly two decades, Majeed’s family was located in the eastern city of Kasur in Punjab.
Abdul Majeed, Kiran’s father, expressed his immense relief. He thanked god that his daughter was found safe at the Edhi center in Karachi.
“I am very grateful to Allah that our girl was safe at the Edhi center,” Majeed’s father said, his voice filled with emotion.
Two other girls who had spent a decade or more at Edhi’s shelter homes were reunited with their families in November.
Amina Rashid was 10 when she was found in the eastern city of Multan in 2016 by Edhi officials. She was also transferred to the shelter home in Karachi after repeated attempts to locate her family failed. Rashid was finally handed over to her family this month, marking almost 10 years since she went missing.
Separately, another girl named Gul Sana, who was found in a Lahore hospital in 2014, went home to her native village in KP’s Bannu district after spending 11 years with the charity at their Karachi shelter home earlier this month.
For Shabana Faisal Edhi, seeing long-lost children reunited with their loved ones after decades fills her with joy. However, it is also always a bittersweet moment.
“When children stay with us for so long, they become our own,” she said. “When they leave, it feels the same as when parents watch their children go far away from them.”
